Portrush Renovation Update: 2019 Open Seems More Secure

This week's YouTube upload depicting to captivating affect the Turnberry renovation plans got the Irish Golf Desk's Brian Keogh thinking about Royal Portrush's similar situation.

Keogh downloads and links to the 45.6 MB PDF by architects Mackenzie and Ebert, who have been charged with giving the course The Treatment finding two new holes while resolving what will happen to the Valley Course when those holes are created. And for anyone who has been to Royal Portrush, there has always been sadnessa bout what would happen to "Big Nellie," the 17th hole's larger-than-life fairway bunker.

He answers that question and more in analyzing the plans which should result in the R&A committing the 2019 Open to Portrush, as previously announced.

As for the two new holes, the downhill seventh will be a 572 yard par five, restoring the yardage lost with the elimination of the 17th, which features the much loved Big Nellie fairway bunker on the right.

Fear not, there will be a new Big Nellie on the new seventh for The Open, which will almost certainly be held in 2019 now that planning permission has been granted by the local authority.

“It is proposed that ‘Big Nellie’ from the existing 17th hole is recreated to the right of this new hole,” the architects explain. “It would fit in very well into the huge dune bank.”

The booklet is a must read for anyone interested in the evolution of a classic course and to see how much sand was exposed in the old days and how intimately-integrated golf and town once were.